The Wicked King (The Folk of the Air #2)(76)

When I put it on, I realize the fabric is the perfect complement to my complexion, although nothing can make me look less starved. No matter how the dress flatters me, I can’t get away from the feeling that my skin doesn’t fit. Still, it will do well for the night.

As I adjust it, however, I realize the dress has several cunningly hidden pockets. I transfer the poison to one. I transfer the smallest of my knives to another.

Then I attempt to make myself presentable. I find a comb among Cardan’s things and attempt to fix my hair. I have nothing to put it up with, so I wear it loose around my shoulders. I wash out my mouth. Then, tying the mask on, I head back to where Balekin waits.

Up close, I am likely to be recognized by those who know me well, but otherwise I think I will be able to pass unnoticed through the larger crowd.

When he sees me, he has no visible reaction but impatience. He stands. “You know what to do?”

Sometimes lying is a real pleasure.

I take the stoppered vial from my pocket. “I was a spy for Prince Dain. I have been a part of the Court of Shadows. You can trust me to kill your brother.”

That brings a smile to his face. “Cardan was an ungrateful child to imprison me. He ought to have put me beside him. He ought to have made me seneschal. Really, he ought to have given me the crown.”

I say nothing, thinking of the boy I saw in the crystal. The boy who still hoped he might be loved. Cardan’s admission of who he has become since haunts me: If he thought I was bad, I would be worse.

How well I know that feeling.

“I will mourn my youngest brother,” Balekin says, seeming to cheer himself a bit at the thought. “I may not mourn the others, but I will have songs composed in his honor. He alone will be remembered.”

I think of Dulcamara’s exhortation to kill Prince Balekin, that he was the one who ordered the attack on the Court of Termites. Maybe he was even responsible for the Ghost setting explosives in the Court of Shadows. I recall him under the sea, exultant in his power. I think of all that he’s done and all he intends to do and am glad I am masked.

“Come,” he says, and I follow him out the door.





Only Locke would make the ridiculous choice of arranging a masquerade for a grave affair of state such as hosting Lord Roiben after an attack on his lands. And yet, when I sweep into the brugh on Balekin’s arm, such a thing appears underway. Goblins and grigs, pixies and elves, all cavort in endless intertwined circle dances. Honey wine flows freely from horns, and tables are stacked with ripe cherries, gooseberries, pomegranates, and plums.

I walk from Balekin toward the empty dais, scanning the crowd for Cardan, but he is nowhere to be seen. I catch sight of salt-white hair instead. I am partway to the convocation from the Court of Termites when I pass Locke.

I swing toward him. “You tried to kill me.”

He startles, a ridiculous grin coming to his face once he recognizes me. Maybe he doesn’t remember the way he limped on his wedding day, but surely he must have known I would see the earrings in Taryn’s ears. Maybe because the consequences took so long in coming, he supposed they wouldn’t come at all.

“It wasn’t supposed to be so serious,” he says, reaching for my hand. “I only wanted you to be afraid the way you’d frightened me.”

I jerk my fingers from his grip. “I have little time for you now, but I will make time for you anon.”

Taryn, dressed in a gorgeous panniered ball gown all robin’s egg blue, embroidered with delicate roses, and wearing a lacy mask over her eyes, sweeps up to us. “Make time for Locke? Whatever for?”

He raises his brows, then takes his wife’s hand. “Your twin is upset with me. She had a gift all planned out for you, but I was the one to present the gift in her stead.”

That’s accurate enough that it’s hard to contradict him, especially given the suspicious way that Taryn is looking at me.

“What gift?” she wants to know. Perhaps she assumes we went somewhere together to choose something. I ought to just tell her about the riders, about how I hid the fight in the forest from her because I didn’t want her to be upset on her wedding day, about how I lost the earrings that Locke must have found, about how I cut one of the riders down and threw a dagger at her husband. About how he wanted me dead.

But if I say all that, will she believe me?

As I am trying to decide how to respond, Lord Roiben moves in front of us, looking down at me with his shining silver eyes, twin mirrors.

Locke bows. My sister sinks into a beautiful curtsy, and I copy her as best as I can.

“An honor,” she says. “I’ve heard many of your ballads.”

“Hardly mine,” he demurs. “And largely exaggerated. Though blood does bounce on ice. That line is very true.”

My sister looks momentarily discomfited. “Did you bring your consort?”

“Kaye, yes, she’s in plenty of those ballads as well, isn’t she? No, I am afraid she didn’t come this time. Our last journey to the High Court was not quite what I promised her it would be.”

Dulcamara said she was badly hurt, but he is taking care to avoid saying so; interesting care. Not a single lie, but a web of misdirections.

“The coronation,” Taryn says.

“Yes,” he goes on. “Not quite the minibreak either of us envisioned.”